Written by J.L. Manning

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Random comments—

I have seen clips of the prosecution’s case against George Zimmerman, and now I believe that he was out of line by taking action against Trayvon Martin. After I saw the clip of Trayvon’s girlfriend using a racial slur against Zimmerman, my first thought was, ‘He’s not even white.’

I am half Irish, a quarter Scottish, and Germen, you can’t get whiter than that, but no one has ever used that slur against me, as far as I know. I grew up less than a mile from Philadelphia, to let you know how diverse my childhood was. As a white man, I took offence from what she said—not really.

As I understand it, George Zimmerman was a night watchman, who job was to watch and report to the proper authorities. The prosecution’s case is that he shouldn’t have had contact with Trayvon.

The clip I saw that his girlfriend said that Trayvon called her to tell her that he was scared, is unbelievable. I guess the prosecution has a report of a phone call, but what was said? My guess is that’s it’s more likely that Trayvon told her, “I can’t shake the night watchman—”

Throughout my childhood until college no one has tried to degrade me, that I know of. A few years ago, I’ve had two African American housekeepers, and I overheard one of them say that my father was uncomfortable talking to her. The other one said that John never seemed uncomfortable around her. My thought was, Why would I—

I was thinking about why people get offended by prejudice slurs; I don’t let what people say bother me. As a child of twelve I was in a car accident and suffered a head trauma, so you can imagine how I was degraded in college, but I tried to ignore everyone. I hope you realize how hard it is, and how angry some can get, but why.

I was riding my bicycle one day up a hill on a narrow sidewalk, and a car drove by me. The man spit on me, he hit my cheek. I was focusing on keeping the bicycle on the narrow sidewalk and rode on. I can imagine that being called a racial slur when you are alone feels much like the loss I suffered that day.

Really I didn’t care that I was spit on at the time, but the feeling of not being able to do anything about being spit on or degraded is the loss I would think someone suffers from random prejudice comments.

Yeah, I would like to see a young bald white man say random prejudice comments when passing a group of African American men, when he’s alone.

Some old lady who I never heard of from the food network, has been fired for such comments. I don’t believe she meant to be hurtful, but I hope this blog helps you understand how random comments can be damaging to some people.